California burns amid US heatwave

 

David McNew/AFP via Getty Images

A wildfire near Yosemite National Park fueled by drought and high temperatures has become the most extensive burning in California. [USA Today / Celina Tebor] Since Friday, the Oak fire has burned nearly 17,000 acres and forced 3,000 people to flee their homes. Though the fire slowed on Sunday, thousands of buildings remain at risk. [New York Times / Thomas Fuller] California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state emergency activating several agencies to respond to the blaze. [CNN / Jason Hanna, Rebekah Riess, Sara Smart, and Andy Rose] The latest fire comes as firefighters battle the nearby Washburn fire, which threatened a grove of giant sequoias and is over 80 percent contained after burning for two weeks. [SF Gate / Amy Graff] As climate change causes warmer temperatures and drier conditions in the West, California wildfires are becoming more destructive and unpredictable. [Associated Press / Noah Berger and Christopher Weber] Meanwhile, 65 million Americans faced extreme heat warnings on Monday. Temperatures are expected to cool in the Northeast but remain dangerously high in parts of the South and Pacific Northwest. [Washington Post / Matthew Cappucci]

 California's gubernatorial recall system could be in for major changes

 

 

• Gov. Gavin Newsom will stay in office after an attempt to replace him using California’s recall system failed. Though state Democrats have celebrated the result, it has also left many wondering if the state's recall system ought to be reformed. [AP / Don Thompson and Kathleen Ronayne]

• The recall’s critics have two main complaints: First, many are asking whether spending the $276 million the election cost was a good use of taxpayer money at a time when California is struggling with massive wildfires, widespread drought, and the ongoing pandemic. [NYT / Thomas Fuller, Maggie Astor, and Conor Dougherty]

• And second, California recall rules state that a majority of voters are needed to recall a governor, but that if the public does fire the executive, they must choose someone else to lead the state — and that gubernatorial candidates need not win a majority of votes to be the next governor. [CalMatters / Laurel Rosenhall]

• In practice, this means if Newsom had been recalled (which would have required at least 51 percent of California voters to want him gone), his main challenger, conservative talk radio host Larry Elder, would have become California’s first Black governor, despite his receiving only 45 percent of the vote. [Decision Desk HQ]

• Democrats worry that this situation will encourage further conservative-led recall efforts. Winning a statewide election in California has become increasingly hard for the GOP, but it is conceivable that, following a successful recall, a Republican candidate could (even with a fairly small base of support) win the election that follows the recall. [Vox / Andrew Prokop]

• This fear has state Democrats considering putting a constitutional amendment before voters in 2022 that would alter the recall system — either allowing a governor in danger of a recall to run in the election to replace them, making recalls more difficult to trigger, or mandating that gubernatorial candidates win a majority of votes in order to be declared the winner of a recall election. [Fred Lucas / Fox News]

Wildfire risk in the West continues high,

The Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Robert Redfield,

 

September 28, 2020 Heather Cox Richardson Sep 29 After last night’s news dump, today was mostly follow-up while everyone takes a deep breath before tomorrow’s presidential debates. Since last night was a late one and the morning early, I’m going to take advantage of the lack of big news to rest up for tomorrow. First, though, a rundown of the little that hit the radar screen: Wildfire risk in the West continues high, with more than 3.7 million acres burned in California alone and 26 dead there. The Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Robert Redfield, was overheard talking on a plane about Trump’s new medical advisor for the coronavirus task force, Scott Atlas, a radiologist and talking head on the Fox News Channel. “Everything he says is false,” Redfield said. Atlas’s advocacy of exposing children to the coronavirus to achieve herd immunity has made public health experts blanch. “Many of his opinions and statements run counter to established science, and, by doing so, undermine public-health authorities and the credible science that guides effective public health policy,” 78 of his former colleagues wrote in an open letter. More than 200,000 Americans have died from Covid-19 and cases are currently rising in 21 states. Vice-President Mike Pence, who heads the White House coronavirus task force, says cases are going to continue to rise. Meanwhile, the New York Times revealed today that, this summer, White House officials pressured the CDC to downplay the dangers of coronavirus to youngsters as the administration pushed the idea of reopening schools. White House officials actively sought to present the idea that the disease was less dangerous to children, and that the psychological damage of staying out of school would be more harmful to them than the coronavirus. While the CDC was trying to make the pros and cons of reopening schools clear, Trump said in early July that children handled the virus well, and “we want to get our schools open. We want to get them open quickly, beautifully, in the fall.” Last night’s tax story earned Trump’s predictable angry tweets. But there was a thundering silence from Republicans about the tax story, while Democrats expressed alarm at the dangers of a president exposed to more than $300 million in debt. For ordinary Americans, even small debt can prevent obtaining a security clearance because it makes a person vulnerable to blackmail or other pressure. After the Republican campaign’s initial reaction was to blame Democrats and “RINOs” for Brad Parscale’s suicide scare and hospitalization yesterday, it turned out today that the issue was domestic violence. A police report showed that Parscale’s wife called police when he loaded a gun. Arriving at the scene, police saw she was was badly bruised and scratched, and she “stated Brad Parscale hits her.” The New York Times tonight issued part 2 of the story of Trump’s taxes, this time a deep dive into how The Apprentice rehabilitated Trump’s image as a wealthy businessman. Finally, the day’s biggest news story dropped tonight, when a member of the grand jury that oversaw the Breonna Taylor case filed a motion asking the judge to release the grand jury proceedings. The motion suggests that the public statements of Kentucky Attorney General David Cameron contradict the evidence the grand jury saw. That grand jury was in charge of considering charges against the three law enforcement officers who executed a no-knock warrant on Taylor’s apartment and ended up murdering the 26-year-old emergency room technician after her boyfriend shot at the men he thought were intruders.

Record Heat Wave Creates 'Kiln-Like' Conditions In California

 

NPR

At 121 degrees, Los Angeles County hit its highest temperature ever recorded this weekend, as the state swelters in a heat wave that has helped intensify the most devastating wildfire season California has experienced in years.

The record temperature was measured in Woodland Hills, northwest of downtown Los Angeles.

The "kiln-like" heat was exacerbated by a high-pressure system and a weak sea breeze, according to the National Weather Service.

NWS Meteorologist Dave Bruno told The New York Times that these factors "allowed basically the entire region to roast." Several other locations in the state also faced scorching temperatures.

The heat contributed to the death of a 41-year-old hiker, who died Saturday from a heat-related seizure after hiking at Tapia Park in Malibu Creek State Park for several hours, L.A. County Sheriff's officials told CNN. After her death, officials decided to close all hiking trails in the Santa Monica Mountains through Labor Day.

"Do not hike this holiday weekend, especially with dogs," Malibu Search and Rescue said. 

Late Monday, the U.S. Forest Service announced it would close eight national forests in Southern California because of the conditions.

California firefighters are currently battling dozens of active blazes that have so far consumed more than 1.8 million acres, damaged over 3,800 structures, and killed seven people. Many of the fires were caused by lightning strikes, but the El Dorado Fire in San Bernardino County was caused by "a smoke generating pyrotechnic device used during a gender reveal party," the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said.

That fire, which began Saturday morning, spread north and quickly consumed more than 7,000 acres. More than 500 people, 60 fire engines and six helicopters were fighting the blaze, which was only 5 percent contained by Sunday night.

2020 has now seen the most acres burned in California than any other year during the modern era, according to Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at UCLA.

But some small relief could be coming. Weakening high pressure and a stronger sea breeze will lead to "some decent cooling across the coast today," NWS Los Angeles tweeted Monday. "A little less cooling inland but it won't be nearly as oppressive as yesterday! Just one more day of heat before we get a break! We got this!"

Calif Wildfires/Postmaster Gen/NYC Gyms/UPDATES

In California, record heat, rolling blackouts and now wildfires test a state already besieged.

On Monday, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California called for an investigation into what he described as a major utility failure that was even more alarming set against the backdrop of the pandemic, when people, many largely confined inside, may be more dependent than ever on electricity: rolling blackouts over the weekend, caused by a record-shattering heat wave.

And a wave of wildfires are also posing particular challenges in the pandemic, Mr. Newsom said, as officials struggle to shelter residents forced to flee, and the state’s firefighting force has been depleted thanks to outbreaks in the state’s prisons.

The power issues and wildfires could also have impact on education. A reporter asked, for instance, about how the state would address the loss of remote learning time, if students lose power. “In extenuating circumstances, we have to be flexible,” he said.

The blackouts came not long after California leaders scrambled to address problems with the state’s virus data reporting system, which clouded case counts and threw into question the list of counties where virus transmission is particularly troubling.

Mr. Newsom said on Monday that the backlog of cases arising from the data glitch had been cleared, and that the state’s seven-day average reflected that.

The state’s positivity rate and other measures, such as hospitalizations, he said, were moving in the right direction.

 

Death Valley Just Recorded the Hottest Temperature on Earth

In the popular imagination, Death Valley in Southern California is the hottest place on earth. At 3:41 p.m. on Sunday, it lived up to that reputation when the temperature at the aptly named Furnace Creek reached 130 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the NOAA Weather Prediction center.

If that reading — the equivalent of 54 degrees Celsius — is verified by climate scientists, a process that could take months, it would be the highest temperature ever reliably recorded on earth.

Death Valley is no stranger to heat. Sitting 282 feet below sea level in the Mojave Desert in southeastern California near the Nevada border, it is the lowest, driest and hottest location in the United States. It is sparsely populated, with just 576 residents, according to the most recent census.

Brandi Stewart, the spokeswoman for Death Valley National Park, said that the valley is so hot because of the configuration of its lower-than-sea-level basin and surrounding mountains. The superheated air gets trapped in a pocket and just circulates. “It’s like stepping into a convection oven every day in July and August,” she said. So how does 130 degrees, which she walked out into on Sunday, feel? “It doesn’t feel that different from 125 degrees,” she said. “The feeling of that heat on my face, it can almost take your breath away.”

She added that “People say, ‘Oh, but it’s a dry heat!’ I want to do a little bit of an eye roll there,” she said. “Humidity has its downsides too, but dry heat is also not fun.”

The heat rises through the afternoon, generally reaching the peak from 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. The high on Monday was 127.

The previous record for highest temperature was also observed in Death Valley on June 30, 2013, at 129 degrees. The same temperature was also recorded in Kuwait and Pakistan several years later.

And that is also important to understand: There may be hotter places than Death Valley, such as parts of the Sahara, but they are too remote for reliable monitoring, said Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California, Los Angeles and the National Center for Atmospheric Research.

As the greenhouse gases that humans generate continue heating the planet, more records are expected, and not just in Death Valley.

The postmaster general received millions in income from a company that works with U.S.P.S., documents show.

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, who has come under fire for financial ties to a company that does business with the United States Postal Service, received between $1.2 million and $7 million in income last year from that firm, according to financial disclosure forms reviewed by The New York Times.

Mr. DeJoy continues to hold between $25 million and $50 million in that company, XPO Logistics, where he was chief executive until 2015 and a board member until 2018. Those stock holdings were first reported last week by CNN.

But documents filed with the Office of Government Ethics show that Mr. DeJoy also receives millions of dollars in rental payments from XPO through leasing agreements at buildings that he owns. The revelations are likely to fuel further scrutiny of Mr. DeJoy, a major donor to President Trump who has made cost-cutting moves and other changes at the Postal Service that Democrats warn are aimed at undermining the 2020 election.

Mr. DeJoy agreed on Monday to testify next week before the House Oversight Committee, where Democrats are expected to press him on the justification for his policies and question his potential conflicts of interest.

Mr. DeJoy has maintained that he has fully complied with federal ethics rules and that the measures he has implemented are necessary to modernize the Postal Service. “I take my ethical obligations seriously, and I have done what is necessary to ensure that I am and will remain in compliance with those obligations,” Mr. DeJoy said in a statement.

Elsewhere on the postal front:

• Two Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee urged the F.B.I. to open a criminal investigation into actions by Mr. DeJoy and the Postal Service’s Board of Governors that may have caused mail delays. “Multiple media investigations show that Postmaster DeJoy and the Board of Governors have retarded the passage of mail,” Representatives Ted W. Lieu of California and Hakeem Jeffries of New York wrote in a letter to the F.B.I. director. “If their intent in doing so was to affect mail-in balloting or was motivated by personal financial reasons, then they likely committed crimes.”

• Mail-in voters from six states filed a lawsuit against Mr. Trump and Mr. DeJoy, seeking to block cuts to the Postal Service ahead of the election.

• Senator Mitch McConnell, pushed back on Monday on concerns that the Postal Service would not be able to handle as many as 80 million ballots come November, telling reporters in his home state that “the Postal Service is going to be just fine” and that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had already signaled a willingness to spend more on it.

• The House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, said Sunday that she would call the House back from its annual summer recess almost a month early to vote this week on legislation to block changes at the Postal Service.

• The postal crisis has forced states to look for alternatives to mail-in ballots.

  Postal slowdowns and warnings of delayed mail-in ballots are causing election officials to rethink vote-by-mail strategies, with some states seeking to bypass the post office with ballot drop boxes, drive-through drop-offs or expanded in-person voting options, despite the coronavirus pandemic.

  The 2020 election was supposed to be the largest-ever experiment in voting by mail, but the Trump administration’s late cost-cutting push at the Postal Service has shaken the confidence of voters and Democratic officials alike. The images of sorting machines being removed from postal facilities, mailboxes uprooted or bolted shut on city streets, and packages piling up at mail facilities have sparked anger and deep worry.

  Even if, as the Postal Service says, it has plenty of capacity to process mail-in ballots, the fear is that the psychological damage is already done. So as Democrats in Washington fight to restore Postal Service funding, election officials around the country are looking for a Plan B.

• The newest front in the battle over voting in 2020 is the drop box, where ballots mailed out to voters can be returned without fear of Postal Service backlogs or coronavirus infection. Once voters deposit their ballots in such boxes, they are collected by election officials and brought to polling places for tabulation.

  Election officials in Connecticut, Virginia, Pennsylvania and elsewhere are seeking to expand drop-off locations for absentee and mail-in ballots, but they have met vehement opposition from President Trump and his campaign.

• • Ahead of a pair of congressional hearings, the US postmaster general is “suspending” new Postal Service initiatives that drew widespread criticism. [Washington Post / Jacob Bogage]
  • P>S>: There’s no meaningful distinction between voting by mail and absentee voting. [Vox / Dylan Matthews]
• 

• U.S. college campuses grapple with coronavirus fears, outbreaks and protests.

• The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill announced it would shift to remote learning for all undergraduate classes starting Wednesday.

  The university, with 30,000 students, was one of the largest in the country to open its campus during the pandemic. Officials said 177 students had been isolated after testing as of Monday, and another 349 students were in quarantine because of possible exposure.

• The university said it would help students leave campus housing without financial penalty. It was not immediately clear how the university’s decision would affect its athletic programs, though North Carolina said that student-athletes could remain in their dormitories.

  The university’s athletic department said in a statement that it still expected its students would be able to play fall sports, but that it would “continue to evaluate the situation.” 

• Earlier this month, dozens of students protested plans to reopen by staging a “die-in” on campus. A similar protest erupted on Monday at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, the first day of fall classes. The school had said that majority of courses would have some in-person attendance this fall, but dozens of students and faculty members staged a “die-in” on campus to push for more options for staff and students to teach or learn remotely.

• Some of the concerns about reopening college campuses have been directed at students who have gathered at bars or house parties. Video footage appearing to show University of North Georgia students attending a crowded off-campus party garnered online attention over the weekend
• 

• N.Y. Gyms and Fitness Studios Can Reopen as Soon as Aug. 24, Cuomo Says.

• Health clubs will be limited to a third of their total capacity and must meet state requirements before reopening.

• Mr. Cuomo’s announcement came with several caveats: Gyms would be limited to a third of their total capacity, and people would be required to wear masks at all times. The state would also require air filters that help prevent airborne transmission of viral particles and sign-in forms to assist with contact-tracing efforts.

  Local governments will also need to inspect gyms to make sure they meet the state’s requirements before they open or within two weeks of their opening.

  Local elected officials can stop gyms from holding indoor classes, Mr. Cuomo said. New York City has decided not to initially allow indoor fitness classes or indoor pools to operate when gyms reopen, a spokesman for the mayor said.

  Mr. Cuomo’s announcement came with several caveats: Gyms would be limited to a third of their total capacity, and people would be required to wear masks at all times. The state would also require air filters that help prevent airborne transmission of viral particles and sign-in forms to assist with contact-tracing efforts.

  Local governments will also need to inspect gyms to make sure they meet the state’s requirements before they open or within two weeks of their opening. Local elected officials can stop gyms from holding indoor classes, Mr. Cuomo said. New York City has decided not to initially allow indoor fitness classes or indoor pools to operate when gyms reopen, a spokesman for the mayor said.

  Mr. Cuomo said on Monday that gyms would be allowed to reopen because New York has successfully kept its rate of positive coronavirus test rates hovering around 1 percent since June.

  Still, Mr. Cuomo said that he remained worried that reopening gyms might accelerate the virus’s spread. He said his main concern was that local governments would not adequately enforce the state’s restrictions, noting, as he has before, how many cities and towns have not aggressively cracked down on bars and restaurants ignoring social distancing measures.

  It was not clear on what day New York City would clear gyms for reopening, or which agency would be responsible for conducting the necessary inspections or enforcing regulations.

  Last week, Mr. Cuomo announced that museums and other cultural institutions in New York City, which stayed closed even as their counterparts reopened in the rest of state, would be allowed to reopen on Aug. 24, at 25 percent capacity and with timed ticketing.

  Also last week, Mr. Cuomo gave bowling alleys statewide the green light to reopen with strict protocols in place: Every other lane is supposed to be blocked off because of social distancing, and bowling equipment must be properly sanitized.

Testing Bottlenecks Threaten N.Y.C.’s Ability to Contain Virus. California Overtakes NY For Most Cases in U.S

“Honestly, I don’t even really see the point in getting tested,” said one New Yorker who has waited nearly two weeks, with still no results.

Despite pledges from Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio to make testing widely accessible and effective, many people in the city who have gotten tested have waited more than a week to learn whether they had the coronavirus. Delays in test results could hinder New York’s ability to control the spread of the disease,

In early July, a quarter of coronavirus test results were returned within 24 hours, but another quarter of tests took more than six days, Avery Cohen, a spokeswoman for the mayor, said.Now, the median wait time at some clinics in New York City is nine days.

Although the mayor and governor have urged New Yorkers to get tested regularly, some public health officials and laboratory executives worry that strategy isn’t sustainable. That’s partly because in New York officials haven’t been able to significantly expand state and city laboratories’ capacity for testing — meaning the delays could get worse before they get better. So far, the backlog does not seem to have contributed to an uptick in transmission. 

The demand for tests is growing faster than laboratories can handle it. That demand is likely to increase as schools begin to reopen — especially because some universities will require that students test negative for the virus before they can attend in-person classes. Mr. Cuomo defended the state’s testing performance on Thursday, noting that the national labs, like Quest Diagnostics, were “getting overwhelmed” by tests from other states.

There are dozens of CityMD walk-in clinics in New York, and thousands of people get tested at them each day. Many of those tests are sent to a lab in New Jersey run by Quest Diagnostics. Quest Diagnostics has provided several reasons that wait times are long, including the high level of demand from employees getting tested before returning to their workplaces.

Test result delays may undermine contact tracing, which alerts people who may have been exposed to the coronavirus so they can avoid spreading it to others. The combination of testing and tracing could be an important factor in warding off a second wave of the outbreak. As of late June, the city had hired 3,000 disease detectives and case monitors.

California Is Once Again at the Center of the Virus Crisis

The state was the first to issue a stay-at-home order, helping to control an early outbreak. It has now surpassed New York for the most known cases of the virus.

 

NY TIMES

When everything shut down in March as the coronavirus took off in California, Canter’s Deli, a mainstay in the Fairfax District of Los Angeles, laid off dozens of employees. A few months later, it called them back to work. By then, the state appeared to have emerged from the initial virus crisis in much better shape than other parts of the country.

But now California’s caseload is exploding, with rising deaths and hospitalizations. As quickly as things had opened up, they have shut down again. California is now in the unwelcome position of having found itself at the center of the pandemic twice over.

 After a reopening that some health officials warned was too fast, cases surged, leading to a new statewide mask mandate and the closure of bars and indoor dining again. With more than 420,000 known cases, California has surpassed New York to have the most recorded cases of any state, and it set a single-day record on Wednesday with more than 12,100 new cases and 155 new deaths.

And as California struggles once again to contain the virus, the multitude of challenges playing out across America have collided in every corner of the state, as if it were a microcosm of the country itself. Some localities have resisted both new shutdowns and enforcing a mandatory mask order. Some rural areas of the state remain relatively unscathed with low case counts, while cases in Los Angeles are skyrocketing. The city’s mayor, Eric M. Garcetti, has warned that a new stay-at-home order could come down in the coming days.

In many parts of San Francisco, Silicon Valley and Los Angeles, people do not leave home without a mask. In Huntington Beach, and across Orange County, residents have openly defied mask orders and protested against them.

In Los Angeles and San Diego, classrooms will be empty this fall, after public school officials decided they were unwilling to risk in-person instruction. But in Orange County, a recommendation by the Board of Education that children return to school without masks became political fodder for debate, even as the governor announced that most California schools would not be able to teach in person.

A long line of cars near a testing site at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles last week.Credit...Robyn Beck/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images[/caption]

 

The contradictions span the state, creating a sense of regional dissonance. In Imperial County, on the southern border with Mexico, hospitals have been so overwhelmed with virus cases that patients have had to be airlifted elsewhere. But in the northernmost tip, the virus has yet to hit Modoc County, an agricultural community of around 9,000, where there were zero known cases as of Thursday.

It is in some ways California’s sprawling nature, with 40 million residents spread across urban downtowns and rural areas, liberal strongholds and conservative alcoves, that has aggravated the feeling of back-and-forth. What applies in one area may not feel necessary in another, even as residents live under statewide orders. And the sense of confusion is often made worse by conflicting political messages from local leaders, the governor and the White House.

MTA Will End Overnight Subway Service For Duration Of Pandemic. UPDATES

The MTA will soon cease overnight subway service, an unprecedented disruption that will allow crews to disinfect trains more frequently to help slow the spread of coronavirus.

In a joint press conference on Thursday, Governor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio said that subways will not run between the hours of 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. for the duration of the pandemic. The indefinite shutdown will begin the morning of May 6th.

Subway ridership has plummeted by 92 percent since the COVID-19 crisis began, and only 10,000 people were using the system during the overnight window, officials said. The MTA will provide buses, for-hire vehicles and "dollar vans" for essential workers traveling at night.

The bombshell announcement follows Cuomo's demand on Wednesday that the MTA begin disinfecting trains on a nightly basis. The governor singled out the number of homeless New Yorkers seeking shelter in the transit system, describing their presence "disgusting and disrespectful."

De Blasio said the curtailed hours would allow for the city to better address that "unacceptable reality." Both state police and NYPD officers will provide a "robust and sustainable" presence during the overnight shutdown, the governor said.

Metro North and the Long Island Railroad trains will also be disinfected regularly, but without service interruptions.

Transit advocates cautioned that the subway shutdown should be a short-term intervention, and must be paired with increased bus service for frontline workers.


Another 3.8 million Americans lose jobs as US unemployment continues to grow

Pace of job losses appears to be slowing but figures increase and many people yet to receive benefits as backlog hits US system

Another 3.8 million people lost their jobs in the US last week as the coronavirus pandemic continued to batter the economy. The pace of layoffs appears to be slowing, but in just six weeks an unprecedented 30 million Americans have now sought unemployment benefits and the numbers are still growing.

The latest figures from the labor department released on Thursday showed a fourth consecutive week of declining claims. While the trend is encouraging, the rate of losses means US unemployment is still on course to reach levels unseen since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

The figures are also still undercounting the number of people out of work. Some states are still dealing with backlogs of claims after their systems were overwhelmed by the massive volume of applications.


Florida has become a notable black spot. As of Tuesday the state had received more than 1.9 million claims and processed just over 664,000, one of the slowest rates in the nation.

Intelligence report concludes Covid-19 was not 'manmade or genetically modified'
The office of the director of national intelligence said the intelligence community does not believe coronavirus was manmade. The new statement comes amid reports that Trump has asked intelligence officials to investigate whether the virus originated from a Chinese government laboratory. Trump implied that he’d seen evidence proving the unproven theory that the coronavirus originated at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. He also repeated claims that China favored Joe Biden over him in the election,
Most epidemiologists believe that a natural transmission of the novel coronavirus from animal to human remains the most likely explanation for the pandemic’s origin.


Trump, under fire about coronavirus response, looks to shift blame to China 

The Trump administration is reportedly pressuring the US intelligence community to seek out evidence supporting an unsubstantiated theory that the coronavirus pandemic has its origins in a Chinese government lab in Wuhan. [NY Times]

Simultaneously, the administration is said to be looking for ways to punish China for its response to the initial coronavirus outbreak. Administration officials have floated several strategies, including clearing the way for Covid-19 victims to sue the country and unilaterally canceling part of the US debt to China. [Washington Post]

Both actions are part of a broader strategy by the GOP: A memo obtained last week by Politico instructed Republican Senate candidates to shift their focus to attacking China rather than defending President Trump’s response to the pandemic. [Politico]

Although Trump has taken an increasingly hostile stance toward China in recent days, a month ago, the president complimented the country’s handling of the coronavirus crisis.
Donald J. Trump(@realDonaldTrump)

Just finished a very good conversation with President Xi of China. Discussed in great detail the CoronaVirus that is ravaging large parts of our Planet. China has been through much & has developed a strong understanding of the Virus. We are working closely together. Much respect!

March 27, 2020



Armed protestors demonstrated against the extension of shelter in place orders in Michigan. 

The demonstrators, some of whom were carrying assault rifles, compared the state’s Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer to Hitler.

Gov. Whitmer of Michigan, a prime political target in partisan clashes over stay-at-home orders during the coronavirus outbreak, signed three executive orders on Thursday to reinstate a state of emergency during the coronavirus pandemic.

The moves, which put into place a new state of emergency through May 28, were in response to the Republican-led State Legislature’s refusal to extend the original emergency declaration on the day it was set to expire.

Republican lawmakers have tried to strip the governor’s power to declare a state of emergency, which underpins the stay-at-home order. Michigan has had more Covid-19 deaths than every state except New York and New Jersey. “By refusing to extend the emergency and disaster declaration, Republican lawmakers are putting their heads in the sand and putting more lives and livelihoods at risk,” Ms. Whitmer, a Democrat, said in a statement. “I’m not going to let that happen.”

A tightly packed crowd of protesters, some carrying rifles, attempted to enter the floor of the legislative chamber, and were held back by a line of state police and capitol staff, according to video footage posted by local journalists. “Let us in! Let us in!” the protesters chanted, as they stood shoulder-to-shoulder inside the statehouse. Few of them were wearing face masks.

FBI notes on Michael Flynn unlikely to convince judge he was entrapped, legal experts say
The notes, taken by a former senior FBI official, fuel expectations of a pardon for President Trump's former national security adviser.

New Jersey is reporting more new daily deaths than any other state.
New Jersey reported 460 new virus-related deaths on Thursday, more than any other state in the nation. The state is now reporting more new deaths than neighboring New York, which saw 306 new deaths on Thursday, less than half of what it was reporting each day when the outbreak peaked there this month.

Gov. Gavin Newsom of California on Thursday shut down the beaches in Orange County, rolling back earlier attempts at giving people there a chance to stroll along the shore while staying a safe distance from one another. But Alabama moved to reopen its beaches, and Texas will do the same in parts of the state on Friday, even as health experts warn that doing so could produce a surge in new virus cases.

“This disease isn’t going away,” Mr. Newsom warned, noting that the pandemic had claimed at least 95 lives in California in the previous 24 hours.

California Passes Landmark Bill to Remake Gig Economy

Image

NY TIMES

California legislators approved a landmark bill on Tuesday that requires companies like Uber and Lyft to treat contract workers as employees, a move that could reshape the gig economy and that adds fuel to a yearslong debate over whether the nature of work has become too insecure.

The bill passed in a 29 to 11 vote in the State Senate and will apply to app-based companies, despite their efforts to negotiate an exemption. California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, endorsed the bill this month and is expected to sign it after it goes through the State Assembly, in what is expected to be a formality. Under the measure, which would go into effect Jan. 1, workers must be designated as employees instead of contractors if a company exerts control over how they perform their tasks or if their work is part of a company’s regular business.

The bill may influence other states. A coalition of labor groups is pushing similar legislation in New York, and bills in Washington State and Oregon that were similar to California’s but failed to advance could see renewed momentum. New York City passed a minimum wage for ride-hailing drivers last year but did not try to classify them as employees.

In California, the legislation will affect at least one million workers who have been on the receiving end of a decades-long trend of outsourcing and franchising work, making employer-worker relationships more arm’s-length. Many people have been pushed into contractor status with no access to basic protections like a minimum wage and unemployment insurance. Ride-hailing drivers, food-delivery couriers, janitors, nail salon workers, construction workers and franchise owners could now all be reclassified as employees.

But the bill’s passage, which codifies and extends a 2018 California Supreme Court ruling, threatens gig economy companies like Uber and Lyft. The ride-hailing firms — along with app-based services that offer food delivery, home repairs and dog-walking services — have built their businesses on inexpensive, independent labor. Uber and Lyft, which have hundreds of thousands of drivers in California, have said contract work provides people with flexibility. They have warned that recognizing drivers as employees could destroy their businesses.

“It will have major reverberations around the country,” said David Weil, a top Labor Department official during the Obama administration and the author of a book on the so-called fissuring of the workplace. He argued that the bill could set a new bar for worker protections and force business owners to rethink their reliance on contractors.

California legislators said the bill, known as Assembly Bill 5 and proposed by State Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, a Democrat, would set the tone for the future of work.

“Today the so-called gig companies present themselves as the innovative future of tomorrow, a future where companies don’t pay Social Security or Medicare,” said State Senator Maria Elena Durazo, a Democrat. “Let’s be clear: there is nothing innovative about underpaying someone for their labor.”

She added, ”Today we are determining the future of the California economy.”

Ride-hailing drivers hailed the bill’s passage. “I am so proud of rideshare drivers who took time out of their lives to share their stories, stand up, speak to legislators and hope they take a moment to bask in a victory,” said Rebecca Stack-Martinez, a driver and an organizer with the group Gig Workers Rising.